Posted on: 02 Jan 2017
Chapter 3 (By P. V. N. M. Sharma)
[Spiritual Preachings of Shir Datta Swami at Srisailam,29-03-1993, 4.00 am.]
Generally, devotees think that if one has seen the energetic form of God, it is the highest stage. But, I assuredly tell you that it is the lowest step. There is nothing in it. Several times Ravana saw the energetic form of God (Shiva). But, Ravana was not blessed by the God and was bitterly killed along with all his family! Rama never saw God Shiva, but was blessed by God with grand victory. What you should aspire is the grace of God and not mere vision of God. As the Prime Minister goes in the street, you might have seen him. But, you are not favored by him in anyway. There is another person, who has not at all seen the prime minister. But, the Prime Minister was pleased with his application and sanctioned a big post to him. Between these two, who is the lucky person? Obviously the second person is fortunate. Hence, you must always try to impress the mind of God by your sacrifice and service and should not crave for vision in which there is nothing!
In doing sacrifice and service, the magnitude is not important. The percentage of the share you sacrifice (wealth or work) is seen by God. A beggar sacrificed one rupee and that is all what he is having! A rich man sacrificed hundred rupees and that is one percent of what all he possessed! The sacrifice of the beggar (one rupee) is the highest and the sacrifice of the rich man (hundred rupees) is lowest! An old person can work only for one hour in a day and a young person can work six hours in a day. The service done by the old person for one hour is far greater than the service done by a young man for two hours! The magnitude of percentage of sacrifice is more important than the actual magnitude of the sacrifice!
While doing sacrifice to God, your angle of attitude or behavior or quality is also very important. A poor man may sacrifice one rupee only and a rich man may sacrifice hundred rupees, the sacrifice will have value only when it is associated with good qualities like fear, humility etc. You should feel fear and shy that you have become the donor (hriyaa deyam, bhiyaa deyam… Veda). You may be rich or poor, but, if you donate with ego and for fame, your donation loses its basic value also. It is the quality of Sattvam if you donate secretly with fear and shy. It is the quality of Rajas if you donate with ego and for fame. It is the quality of Tamas if you donate without any feeling. The example for Tamas is an inert cloud raining on the Shiva Linga (statute) without any feeling for which there is no fruit for bathing the statute of Lord. Language in which you pray is not at all important. God knows all the languages of this world. Some people in Hinduism feel that praying in Sanskrit Language is great. Such feeling is totally wrong because God knows all the languages. God gives more importance to your feeling, which is the meaning of your prayer. Practical sacrifice is more important than the feeling. Even in the practical sacrifice, if you do not have desire for any fruit in return, God gives top most importance to this point of climax of devotion! If you pray God in a language, which is not known to you, God will treat you as the biggest fool. If you pray God with very good feelings without any practical sacrifice, God will treat you as a prostitute, who collects money for expressing false feelings of love. If you sacrifice practically with good feeling for some benefit in return, God will treat you as a merchant, who exchanges the items for cash. If you sacrifice practically with very pure theoretical devotion without expecting anything in return, God will be extremely pleased with you since you have shown at least the real love that is shown to your issues. These four types of worship are in the ascending order of merit from beginning to last.
I am fed up with your false love to Me, which is either love of prostitute (veshyaa bhakti) by aspiring practical fruit from Me for your sacrifice of sweet theoretical devotion (prayers and songs) or deal of merchant (vyshya bhakti) by aspiring practical fruit from Me for your practical sacrifice of work or fruit of work. You have ocean of real love (both theoretical and practical) towards your issues, which is the result of pure theoretical love i.e., sacrifice of work and its fruit without aspiring anything in return. Sacrifice at least a drop from that ocean to Me as humble beginning to prove that I am at least a small trace before your issues! In view of this truth, don’t speak lies by reciting prayers meaning that I am above everybody and everything!
Even if you sing on God with very sweet voice, God is not pleased if you are aspiring for some fruit in return. Even if you sing with very harsh voice, if your song has no background of any aspiration in return, God is highly pleased. Your intention is important and not the merit of the mode of worship.
A Saatvika devotee desires for liberation from the worldly bonds (Moksha). A Raajasa devotee desires for all the worldly benefits. A Taamasa devotee does not get any fruit due to mechanical worship without any feeling. If the feeling (theoretical devotion) is totally absent, the practical devotion also becomes useless. The highest Nivrutti devotee of climax (is different from Saatvika devotee, who aspires for good fruits in this world) also may not get any fruit in return for his/her practical devotion like the Taamasa devotee (the Taamasa devotee does not get fruit for inertness whereas the climax devotee does not get any fruit since there is no aspiration for any fruit). But, this Nivrutti devotee is with full of theoretical devotion in his/ her practical devotion and hence God is fully pleased with such highest devotee and will be ready to give any necessary required fruit at any time even though it is not aspired. The Taamasa devotee does not care for God and God also does not care for him/her.
Service and Fruits
29-03-1993, 8.00 am.
The word karma (work) in spiritual knowledge means only your practical sacrifice of service and fruit to God and not the general worldly work used for earning etc. Fruit of work is matter and work is a form of energy. Matter is also a form of energy only. Hence, sacrifice of work and its fruit are one and the same in terms of the units of energy. A house- holder must do sacrifice of both and a saint can do only sacrifice of work. A saint is not having worldly bonds and has only bond with God. This is not great. A house-holder having worldly bonds has to succeed those to have only bond with God. Successful saint is like a candidate not appearing for examination and declaring himself to have passed it. Successful house-holder is like a candidate appearing in the examination and declared by the University to have passed it. A house-holder is far better than saint. The house-holder can gradually reach (krama mukti) the stage of sainthood in old age through the spiritual effort put throughout his/her life. Leaving the family by wearing saffron cloth is not real sainthood. Hence, sage Paraashara banned the sainthood in this Kali age. Your real love to God in practice is the real saffron cloth. You can’t take Shankara as an example for direct sainthood, who is the human incarnation. Moreover, the duty of sainthood is to propagate the spiritual knowledge by constantly wandering on the earth. In the present time, such sacrifice of family to propagate divine knowledge is not necessary since the propagation can be done by computers without leaving your house. You are successful when you maintain your attraction towards God at upper level in the presence of the opposite attraction of worldly bonds in the house!
Spiritual knowledge means only the subject confined to God and not in any way to the world. Hence, sacrifice of work and its fruit are confined to the spiritual field (Nivrutti) only and not to worldly life (Pravrutti). You need not do free service and donate back the salary to your worldly employer! Nishkaama karma Yoga or free service without any fruit in return preached by the Gita is limited to God only since the word Yoga means the association with God. You should not be exploited by the worldly employer. Of course, it is true that you must have the training of concept in the world so that it will be easy to implement it in spiritual line. In such case, you take the training by serving the poor people and you have to serve without aspiring any fruit in return since the poor man can’t pay back to you in anyway. Shankara recommended this in the case of service to poor people (deyam deena janaayacha…). Of course, you have to take lot of care and precaution in seeing that the poor people, generally addicted to sinful habits, don’t misuse your donation and get damaged further. A hasty donation to poor people is not correct. Instead of donating a small coin to poor every day, these coins should be stored and an association of such donors should be formed to maintain beggar homes in which food, cloth, shelter and medicine are freely supplied to the deserving beggars. Children, old people, disabled and diseased categories in beggars really deserve for such free service. Be careful to beggars acting as disabled! You must provide work to earn for other category of beggars in these beggar homes. Donation is a double edged sword. If the donation is done to deserving and if it is not misused, that is the best path to heaven. Hasty donation without recognizing the deservingness is the worst path to hell. Hence, you must think well and analyze deeply before doing donation so that you can avoid hell even if the heaven is not attained! A religious trust maintained by ordinary human beings will commit many such mistakes, if not guided by the best scholar of spiritual knowledge like the human incarnation Bhagavan Shri Satya Sai Baba. I will just analyze a small issue of the service done by several trusts in doing supply of food to the devotees attending the temple as attraction of business to donors. Every devotee is forced to take the food since the food is labeled as the remains of food taken by God (Prasada). This is not correct. The food can be sold to the devotees in reduced rates. The entire money for this program can be spent in maintaining the beggar homes so that the deserving needy people are effectively served. The reason for hasty donation is the importance of place (desha) and date (kaala). “This place is Tirupati and today is holy Ekadashi and let me donate to poor on this day and in this place”. This is the reason for the hasty donation. Deservingness of receiver (paatra) is not analyzed. Lord Krishna donated all His wealth to Sudaama (Kuchela) seeing the deservingness of the receiver. The place of donation was not Tirupati and the date of donation was not Ekadashi. Since the receiver has topmost deservingness, the place of donation is real Tirupati and the date of donation is real Ekadashi. The Veda says that the receiver should have 1) excellent spiritual knowledge or devotion and 2) aspiration for nothing from donor (Shrotrisyasya chaakaamahatasya).
Devotee asking for small worldly benefits is like a small pick pocketing thief. Devotee asking for monism with Me (kaivalya) is like a robber looting the whole bank! Hence, Shankara told that he is not asking for salvation also (Na Mokshasyaakaamkshaa…). The monism should be offered by God for certain purpose of welfare of spiritual world. You should always aspire to remain as the separate devotee like Hanuman and Radha. Don’t think that you can do whatever you like by becoming human incarnation through monism. You can have the same facility while remaining as the top most devotees also. In the monism, you have the risk of fall by the praise of devotees and you cannot enjoy the bliss from worship of God. The top most devotee has the same benefit without risk. Shri Paramahamsa told that He would like to be a separate ant to swallow the sugar instead of becoming the sugar itself being bitten by ants!
Datta: God ‘Given’ to Souls
29-03-1993, 10.30 am.
You will be astonished to see the top most Lord Datta appearing always as the lowest beggar. You must learn from such vision that you should lower yourself as you ascend up. Lord Datta is the first energetic incarnation of unimaginable God (Parabrahma). As soon as this energetic form was created, the unimaginable God merged with It and hence there was no gap of time for this fist energetic form to become a devotee of God and then to be blessed to become incarnation. Even if the gap of time is given, there is no use because no created form can even imagine the unimaginable God—not to speak of becoming His devotee! In the case of human incarnation, God selects the top most devotee for His merge. Hence, the medium of human incarnation had the opportunity to become devotee of God. The first energetic incarnation (Datta) never had such opportunity to become a devotee before becoming incarnation. The only purpose of the first energetic incarnation for unimaginable God is only to express Himself to the souls to be created thereafter. Hence, in view of this single purpose, there is no difference between unimaginable God and Datta (Father of heaven). All the souls are devotees of Datta only and Datta is not devoted to anyone being merged with the ultimate God Himself in the beginning of creation itself. There is no difference between energetic incarnation and human incarnation in the point of expression of unimaginable God to the souls. Both are actually one and same since in both the unimaginable God and the created medium used for expression are exactly one and the same. The above said difference was accidental co-incidence only and thus Datta and any human incarnation like Sai Baba are one and the same.
Ramanuja and Madhva have taken Datta as the first energetic incarnation of unimaginable God called as Narayana. Narayana means the possessor of spiritual knowledge or awareness (its basic material). Shankara has taken this awareness as the medium of unimaginable God. Even the awareness is a specific work form of inert energy functioning in specific nervous system only. The medium of awareness suggests that the unimaginable God is never mediated by inert energy without awareness (energetic incarnation) and is also never mediated by inert human body without awareness.
Hence, there is no basic difference between awareness (nervous energy and inert energy). Datta Swami preferred the matter, which is another form of inert energy or human body to be the medium of unimaginable God in which both nervous energy and inert energy also co-exist. At least inert energy exists independently but awareness needs a basis like energetic body or human body. If you want coffee to drink, it can be supplied only with a cup. Similarly, awareness does not exist independently without a basis like energetic body (Narayana) or materialized body (Krishna or Sai Baba). You must note that the energetic form of Ramanuja and Madhva invariably contains awareness also and thus you can’t differentiate these three preachers anywhere at any time. The content is the unimaginable God (creator) and the container is energy with awareness or matter with energy and awareness (creation). Therefore, the Gods of all the religions in this entire world are only the energetic or materialized human expressions of Father of heaven only. Datta is the actor and the expressed forms of God in different religions are only the roles. If you wound (hurt) the expressed form of God of any religion, that wound appears in the forms of God in all the religions of this world and also the wound appears on the basic actor, who is the Father of heaven. For God’s sake, don’t criticize any expressed form of God of any other religion in this world since you don’t know that by doing so you are criticizing the expressed form of God of your religion itself!
The same Father of heaven (Datta) merges with several human forms in this world and also with several energetic forms in the upper world. Merge of Datta means merge of unimaginable God only. Datta, the external energetic form is like the soluble capsule containing the unimaginable God—antibiotic. In energetic incarnation there are two items: 1) Unimaginable God and 2) The external energetic form in which the energetic form called Datta is merged. In human incarnation, there are three items: 1) Unimaginable God, 2) The energetic form of Datta that merged with the energy of the human body and 3) The external materialized human body. Since matter and energy are in one and the same created phase, ultimately there are two items only in any incarnation: 1) The unimaginable God introduced through energetic incarnation called Datta and 2) The created phase, which is energy or matter.
Managing One’s Body and Mind
29-03-1993, 01.00 pm.
This human body established by God is like a factory established by an industrialist. The profit of the factory is divided in to three parts: 1) A part for the salaries of the workers, 2) Another part used to purchase the raw materials for the factory and 3) The last remaining part to be submitted to the owner of the factory as profit. Similarly, the energy released by the digestion of food should be also partitioned into 1) Energy consumed by the biological systems (workers) of the body like heart, lungs, kidneys, brain etc., 2) Energy in the form of work done by the body to earn the food (raw material) necessary for conversion in to energy and 3) The remaining last part of energy to be submitted to the owner of this body (God) in His service.
The factory needs some gap of rest so that constant work of machines results in deterioration of the efficiency. Hence, rest is needed for this body in regular intervals which should never be disturbed. You may change the workers in shifts to run the factory continuously not minding the deterioration of the machines. In the body, you can’t do so because the biological systems can’t be changed in shifts. You (soul) are the manager of this body-factory and you have no right to spend the profit of the factory in unnecessary ways and reduce the profit of the owner. The owner will not be pleased with you in such case. You submit the profit to the owner without any unnecessary wastage so that the owner (God) of this body-factory is extremely pleased with you and you are uplifted.
You can make every needful activity also in terms of the direction to God. Shankara says that let every activity become the service to God (saparyaa paryaayah…). Let your walk for health be walking around the temple. Let the exercise of your body be the prostrations to God. Let your eating and drinking be felt that God is served with food and drink through you. Even if you see a picture or serial, certainly the story will be concentrated around the hero to succeed always in destroying the injustice and supporting justice like Arjuna in the war doing the work of God to protect justice and destroy injustice (Paritraanaaya… Gita). You feel the hero of the cinema to be the representative servant of God. Even if you see a story in which the injustice succeeds, feel pained and think a solution for such crime taking place in the society to assist the work of God in the world. Don’t learn the sin like learning the tricks in robbing a bank and implement those tricks to successfully rob the bank. All most all the pictures show the victory of justice and punishment of injustice, which is the ultimate goal of Pravrutti to please God. The picture may initiate the control of sin through fear for punishment, which is also essential for a beginner. But, if you take the same story to control sin because it displeases God, your background of Pravrutti is changing its color to Nivrutti. If you feel the help of God to the hero at every step, such modern picture is also equal to seeing the story of the Ramayana and the Mahabharatam. Whenever, there is success for justice in the story, if you feel the presence of will of God in the background, you are proceeding in the spiritual line even while seeing cinemas, serials and reading social novels. The angle of your view decides the results. Even if a fellow reads the Ramayanam and the Mahabharatam as simply histories without the background of God in Rama and Krishna, it is equal to reading the historic novels only. In this way, you can divert your attention to God in every activity of your life, which increases your devotion and leads you up in the spiritual line.
Your mind or the mind of any human being can’t travel straight in the spiritual path. It will always divert to that side and this side every time. Hence, your journey towards to God can never be straight like the mind of the saint leaving the worldly life and sitting alone in a forest in the concentration on God. Such path is just an idea only and not at all practical. Even in such state, the body needs food and other activities of life are inevitable. One saint was having just two small cloths so that he wears both on alternative days. Daily one cloth washed is put on the branch of a tree for drying. A rat was attacking the cloth. To control the rat he brought a cat. For cat, daily milk is to be given and hence a buffalo was purchased. The buffalo needs servant. The servant needs food for which he married and got children. A visitor saw the saint alone 10 yrs back. The same visitor went there after 10 yrs. and found him as house-holder with lot of establishment. The visitor asked the saint about that entire establishment. The saint showed the wet cloth hanging on the branch and told him that whole establishment was to protect that cloth (Kaupina samrakshanaartham ayam patatopah)! This means that worldly life is inevitable to any soul in this world and leaving the worldly life is biggest hypocrisy! Hence, the mind is constantly diverted to both sides while travelling forward towards God. This is represented by a serpent travelling in curves in the straight path. The curves of the serpent also stand for the propagation of energy in the form of waves. Energy always travels as waves and mind is only the nervous energy. Hence, you have to develop the spiritual path with reference to the constantly associated worldly life dragging to both sides. Hence, straight path and short time for the straight journey is impossible. The Gita says that generally several life-cycles are required to reach the ultimate goal (bahunaam janmanaam…).
Kundalini Yoga to Reach the Human Incarnation
29-03-1993, 4.00 pm.
The wheels in the body starting from anus to the roof of the skull indicate the three qualities called as Sattvam, Rajas and Tamas. The top two wheels (Aajna for mind and Sahasraara for intelligence) stand for Sattvam. Next, the lower three wheels (Vishuddha, Anaahata and Svaadhisthaana) stand for Rajas. Vishuddha stands for space or invisible inert energy. Even though sound is not the characteristics of space, but, the existence of volume (parimaana) of space allows the molecules to collide with each other to propagate the sound. Above this wheel, the awareness starts and thus this (throat) indicates a junction of inert energy and awareness. Hence, the words as inert sound energy, but, indicating the feelings of mind as meaning is justified to be a place of junction for inert energy (sound) and feeling (awareness). The lower wheel is Anaahata in the heart showing the place of lungs on both sides in to which the air (vaayu) enters. The next lower wheel indicates Svaadhisthaana in which the food is digested by the hunger-fire in the stomach, which is fire or visible energy. Rajas stands for energy as its meaning is dust particles floating in air or sparks in the visible fire. Even the space is invisible energy made of dust particle-like-quanta energy. Below this, in the lower womb the impure water (Manipura wheel) in urinary bladder and the impure solid as excretion material (Mulaadhaara wheel) in the rectum present in anus indicate the solidified matter as Tamas to be always rejected out. The forehead starting from the central spot between two eyebrows (Aajnaa) up to the roof of the skull (Sahasraara) represents brain or awareness. Any deed is generated by the idea from brain and hence its corresponding fruits are also written here by God Brahma. The ratio of belief and disbelief on the human incarnation is also seen on the forehead of devotee and according to that ratio, the human incarnation speaks about itself in the same proportional ratio. If the ratio is 0:100, it speaks that it is only messenger of God (Dualism or Dvaita). If the ratio is 50:50, it speaks that it is son of God (special monism or Vishishta Advaita). If the ratio is 100:0, it speaks that it is God (Advaita or Monism). As per the receiving capacity of the receiver, the human incarnation expresses itself. The Gita says that Sattvam is top most, Rajas is middle and Tamas is bottommost (Uurdhvam gachchanti…). This uppermost region of Sattvam stands for knowledge. Below this, the region of Rajas exists showing nose to inhale the air and mouth to take food and the stomach for digestion of food to liberate inert energy necessary for work, which is the characteristic of Rajas (Rajah karmani… Gita) (inert energy transforming in to work). Below this, the region of Tamas is two visible states of matter (water and solid) to be always rejected out. The significance of wheels is in several directions of interpretation. It is top most ignorance to take these as real wheels or real lotus flowers!
If you are interested in the spiritual line, I will send preachers of different levels to come into your contact. You will meet and believe Me in the final level like research student working for PhD degree in contact with a professor. The preachers preach according to your levels of receiving capacity. When you reach the top most level of receiving capacity, certainly I will come in contact with you in the final stage.
If you spend lot of energy in short time in your spiritual effort, you will be exhausted soon. If you control the expenditure of energy, you can keep the effort for a long time. Before implementing the practical spiritual efforts, you must have the total true knowledge of three items (triputi), which are: 1) Regarding you that you are not God already, 2) Regarding the path towards God, which is the real devotion involving perfect theoretical devotion as well as perfect practical devotion in the form of sacrifice of work and its fruit and 3) The goal, which is the unimaginable God mediated in relevant human form. Unless you come to confirmation in the spiritual knowledge through sharp analysis, you should not practice in anyway, which may be a wrong step in the opposite wrong direction, by which you are going far from the right goal.
Controlling Vices and Sins
29-03-1993, 8.00 pm.
There are six vices, which are 1) illegal sex (kama), 2) violence (krodha), 3) greediness (corruption of money), 4) fascination (moha), 5) Ego (mada) and 6) jealousy (maatsarya). The first three affect other souls and hence are considered to be strong sins or main gates to the hell as per the Gita. The latter three are not serious in case others are not affected. Illegal sex with some soul pains its life partner to a very deep extent. Violence to kill living beings for food and killing people for various reasons like rowdyism or terrorism is the greatest sin. Earning unlawful money by exploiting others is also a very serious sin since the affected persons suffer a lot. The punishment of death sentence to a person involved in killing others must be avoided as far as possible unless it is inevitable as in the case of a rigid soul reluctant to change. The killed person will not return whether you hang the killer or give life imprisonment. First, you must try to change the mentality of killer through spiritual knowledge by giving life imprisonment so that the killer will not kill a second innocent person in the society. If the killer can be changed by the spiritual knowledge, such possibility should be always taken as first consideration. Punishment is always to change the soul and not to revenge against the killer for his/her crime since such revenge will not bring back the killed victim. The judgment of death sentence should be the last resort in case of absence of any hope of the transformation of the soul. If the soul is transformed, which is proved by the non-repetition of sin, all the past crime irrespective of its intensity should be excused. Repentance of the sin becomes valid only on non-repetition of the sin. The spiritual knowledge should be preached to such extreme sinner during the lifelong imprisonment. Even in the upper world (hell), only the souls having no hope of transformation are punished by the serious liquid fire. Mere theoretical confession and repentance without non-repetition of sin is of no use. Stealing others money by cheating or corruption is also very serious sin because the looted person will suffer throughout the life. Illegal sex, corruption for money and violence are in the ascending order of seriousness. Pravrutti is the balance of the society, which is created by God and is always the ultimate aim of the creator. Nivrutti is certainly the highest about which God is not bothered at all. Nivrutti gives highest protection to the soul and hence is important from the view point of the souls. God expects at least the Pravrutti from every soul.
Control of the three principle sins in this world, by which full justice and peace are established, is the main concentration of God in His preaching. The owner of an industry always puts primary effort in seeing that all the workers in the industry work with full justice, peace and harmony (Pravrutti). Arjuna asked the Lord for the reason that forces every soul to do the sin in practical situation. The Lord said that the wrong knowledge very strongly impressed on the mind of the soul for several births is the reason and the only solution for this is an equivalent impression of correct knowledge that destroys the past impressions, which are the six vices. A diamond alone can cut another diamond. After hearing true knowledge (Shravana), it should be memorized (Manana) continuously through the propagation till it becomes very strong decision (Nididhyaasa). Propagation is mainly beneficial to you than to others! Nivrutti is always the proposal from the side of the soul, which is to become very close family member of God passing through severe tests of God appearing to oppose this proposal strongly. In Pravrutti the entire responsibility lies on you in any risk whereas in Nivrutti God takes your total responsibility and hence Nivrutti is said to be the highest fruit (Nivruttistu mahaaphalaa). Pravrutti is the child catching the womb of mother-monkey (Markatakishora Nyaaya) with risk and Nivrutti is the mother-cat catching its child by mouth (Maarjaalakishora Nyaaya) without risk.
Third chapter is over.
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